


"as it's called again"

by talkwordytome



Series: songbird [2]
Category: Ocean's 8 (2018), Ocean's Eleven Trilogy (Movies)
Genre: Abusive Relationships, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/F, Hurt/Comfort, Original Character(s), ocean's gay-t
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-27
Updated: 2018-07-27
Packaged: 2019-06-17 06:29:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,946
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15455379
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/talkwordytome/pseuds/talkwordytome
Summary: I will hold on hope & I won’t let you chokeOn the noose around your neck& I’ll find strength in pain& I will change my waysI’ll know my name as it’s called again--Mumford & Sons, “The Cave”or, Tammy leaves her fucking fuck of a husband and finds out she’s stronger than she ever could have imagined.





	"as it's called again"

**Author's Note:**

> Hi hi! So first of all, I feel like it's important for me to tell y'all that I typically do not write and post things this often; I'm an elementary school teacher, and I'm currently on summer break, so I have free time on my hands. Once school is in session again I imagine I won't be updating and adding things this quickly, just FYI.
> 
> This is the second entry in the "songbird" series and it's Tammy-centric. It's also a lot to very angsty (though I promise the ending is happy). It deals pretty heavily with domestic violence; I don't get too graphic because that's just not something I'm comfortable writing at this point in my life, but if domestic violence of any kind is something that's upsetting or triggering for you, you may want to be careful when you read this. Abuse/domestic violence are issues that are really important to me, and I hope this fic depicts them in a sensitive, realistic, and nuanced way. 
> 
> This is rated Mature for language and references to violence. Again, none of the descriptions are graphic, and I imagine most older teens could read this with no problem, but I wanted to err on the side of caution.

The first time Graham hits her, they’re decorating the Christmas tree. 

It somehow isn’t secured in its stand tightly enough, and she’s upstairs putting on her pajamas and Graham is in the kitchen fixing a drink, and suddenly Zoe is screaming and Caleb is shouting for her to _come quick, Mommy, now now_! 

Tammy rushes into the living room and discovers the tree lying on the ground, a few ornaments smashed beneath it. Zoe and Caleb are standing off to the side, frightened and tearful but blessedly unharmed. “Oh, lovebugs, come here,” Tammy soothes, gathering them in her arms. 

“It fell down, Mommy,” Zoe whimpers. “Caleb tried to stop it but I made him move because it woulda smushed him.”

“You are both so brave,” Tammy says, kissing their foreheads. “I’m so lucky that I have you.” 

“Daddy,” Caleb says urgently, and Tammy looks over and realizes Graham is standing in the doorway. “Can you fix it? It fell. Can you fix it?”

“Sure, buddy,” Graham says, easily hoisting the six-year-old into his arms. “Of course I can fix it.”

Tammy wonders if she should perhaps point out that the fresh drink in his hand is his third in as many hours.

Graham’s version of “fixing” the tree ends up being tying a rope around it and then nailing that rope in the wall, which Tammy doesn’t discover until he’s already started hammering. “What are you doing?” she asks, voice raised, hoping that Zoe and Caleb won’t hear over the noise Graham is making.

“Fixing the tree,” Graham says, staring at Tammy as if this should be obvious.

“You can’t nail it into the wall, Graham.”

“Why not?”

“Because then we’ll have a bunch of holes in our fucking wall!”

Tammy knows how this will go, or at least she thinks she does. She’ll yell, he’ll yell louder, she’ll storm out of the room, he’ll break something, and then they’ll both tearfully apologize as they fall asleep. Lather, rinse, repeat; same shit, different day; et cetera.

But then, as Tammy tries to grab the hammer from out of Graham’s hands, he turns and slaps her across the face so quickly she doesn’t even think to yell out. The noise of his palm on her cheek is an almost cartoonish pop; it is so startling and unexpected that if it weren’t for the stinging handprint it left behind, Tammy would almost think it must’ve happened to someone else.

Before she knows what she’s really doing, she’s bundled Zoe and Caleb in their winter coats and shepherded them out the door, even as Graham shouts for her to come back. Their across the street neighbor, a kind, grandmotherly woman who sometimes babysits for Caleb and Zoe, flicks her downstairs lights on. Tammy sees them blazing through her windows. _Fine_ , Tammy thinks. _Let her watch. It doesn’t matter. It’s never fucking mattered._

She takes Zoe and Caleb to McDonald’s and buys them Happy Meals and ice cream sundaes. She tells them that once they are finished eating, they are going to go home and pack their bags, and then they will leave, and they won’t see Daddy again for a while. It isn’t until Caleb crawls under the table with his hands over his ears and Zoe heaves with noisy sobs that Tammy realizes they might not understand what’s going on. 

When they get home, Graham is asleep on the couch. _It’s a Wonderful Life_ is playing on the TV. The tree is standing and decorated, though not nailed into the wall, and the broken ornaments have been cleaned off the carpet. Zoe is asleep in Tammy’s arms, and Caleb is leaning against Tammy as he sucks his thumb, a habit he’d given up over a year ago. He stares blearily up at her. “Mommy,” he says.

“Yes, baby?”

“When we leave, does Daddy come with us?”

Tammy, exhausted to the point of feeling faint, does not know how to answer him. Her son, her sweet boy, his face round and trusting and familiar, waits expectantly. Tammy breathes in, out, in again.

“Let’s go to bed,” is what she finally settles on. “We’ll all feel better in the morning.”

They go to sleep. They wake up. She makes waffles for breakfast. They do not mention the night before. They stay.

***

The second time Graham hits her is behind a water slide at Great Wolf Lodge. The third time is at a movie theater. The fourth and fifth times they are in their own bedroom. The sixth time they are at his mother’s. The seventh time they are at hers. The eighth time he gives her a black eye she carefully disguises with foundation and laughing tales of her clumsiness. After the ninth time, Caleb kisses her fiercely as she drops him off at school and tells her that he can protect her.

After the tenth time, she takes Caleb and Zoe, and they finally, finally leave.

***

Tammy does not know what Lou and Debbie must be thinking when she appears at the loft at 1:30 in the morning, pale and shaken, with Caleb clinging to her left hand and Zoe balanced on her right hip. They are all three in their pajamas; Caleb and Zoe are sleep rumpled and confused, with messy hair and swollen eyes. She did not think to pack bags; she has nothing, not even clean underwear.

Tammy had prepared an entire speech during the long drive over, an explanation, something reassuring and full of easy-going shrugs. _Hey, couples fight! What can you do? Is it okay if we stay here for a day or two while it all blows over? No need to worry; everything is fine, just fine. I’m fine. It’s always fine. Fine fine fucking fine._  


But then she takes one look at Lou and Debbie’s faces, their eyes wide with concern and love, and some dam inside of her breaks. Her lip quivers, and she bursts into tears. Debbie and Lou move seamlessly as a ballet. Debbie wordlessly whisks Caleb and Zoe away, presumably to an upstairs bedroom, and Lou wraps an arm around Tammy and leads her over to their couch. “Sweetheart,” Lou says, and her voice is so warm and sympathetic, the term of endearment so unexpected and genuine, that Tammy cries even harder.

Lou disappears into the kitchen and when she comes back she is carrying a tumbler full of bourbon. She hands it to Tammy. “Drink this,” she instructs. “It’ll help you calm down.” 

Tammy takes a long gulp, sputtering slightly when it burns in her chest. Her heart slows its frantic thrumming and she takes another, smaller sip. “Better?” Lou asks, and Tammy nods.

Tammy is almost done with her bourbon when Debbie walks into the room. “They’re asleep,” she says, collapsing on the couch next to Tammy.

“Thanks, Deb,” Tammy sniffles, managing a watery smile.

They sit silently for what feels like a long time to Tammy; the three of them curled on the couch like puppies. Tammy doesn’t know what happens tomorrow, doesn’t know what she’s going to tell Zoe and Caleb, doesn’t know if Graham is going to come looking for her, doesn’t know a single goddamn thing. But she finds that she doesn’t have enough energy to give a fuck.

“You wanna tell us what happened, Tim-Tam?” Debbie asks softly.

Tammy shakes her head. “Not tonight,” she says. “Okay?”

Debbie nods, and she doesn’t look thrilled with Tammy’s answer, but she knows better than to push it. “There’s a guest bed upstairs with your name on it,” she says instead. “I don’t know how you’re even awake right now, bug.”

Tammy realizes that her eyes are closed. She can’t quite bring herself to open them. “I’m not sure I am,” she says, and it comes out in a whisper.

The next thing Tammy knows, she is being led up the stairs and tucked into a large bed covered in throw pillows. Her body sinks into the impossibly soft mattress. Someone kisses her forehead; someone else tucks the covers carefully around her. She isn’t sure what she has done to deserve such tenderness. But she is eternally grateful for it, all the same.

***

Tammy sleeps for ten hours and wakes feeling much closer to human. She gets up and dresses in clothes someone’s left at the foot of her bed (she assumes they must belong to Debbie, since they aren’t stupidly long on her) and goes downstairs. For the few minutes she has been up she’s managed to keep a rapidly brewing panic attack at bay, but she cannot stop the questions that rattle around her brain, most notably: where the fuck do they go from here?

She finds Debbie and Lou in the kitchen. Caleb and Zoe are sitting at the counter, still wearing their pajamas, eating grilled cheese sandwiches and apple slices. “Mommy!” they shout joyfully when they notice her, and practically tackle her with their hugs. Tammy breathes in their smells and tries to let this be enough to ground her.

She looks at Debbie and Lou from over the tops of her children’s heads. _Thank-you_ , she mouths. She knows she should say something more but she can’t; there aren’t words enough for this kind of gratitude. 

“You know, you’re welcome to stay,” Lou says, answering the question Tammy couldn’t figure out how to ask. “As long as you need.”

Tammy opens her mouth to offer the requisite polite protest, but Debbie stops her before she can begin. “Don’t even try it,” Debbie says sternly. 

Tammy glares at her. “I was just going to--” she tries again, but Debbie shakes her head.

“I know exactly what you were going to do, Miss Southern Hospitality,” Debbie says, rolling her eyes. Then she puts on a spectacularly bad southern accent. “Oh Debbie, I wouldn’t dream of putting y’all out like that! Why my stars and garters, y’all must think I am plum crazy.”

Tammy scowls. Lou poorly conceals her smile behind a napkin. Zoe and Caleb giggle uncontrollably. “Aunt Debbie is silly, Mommy,” Caleb says approvingly. “Can we please stay? It’s fun here. Daddy can maybe come, if he doesn’t yell. Because there’s no yelling here, okay? Yelling scares Zo-Zo. And me, kind of, but I have to be brave for her and for you.”

 _From the mouths of babes_ , Tammy vaguely thinks, just before she buries her face in her hands and starts crying for the second time in thirty-six hours. 

This, naturally, sets off Caleb and Zoe, and Tammy tries to comfort them, but isn’t sure how effective that is when she’s also a blubbery mess of snot and tears. Lou quietly dries Caleb and Zoe’s little faces and takes them by their hands into another room to finish their lunches. Tammy can just make out Lou telling them some story, Zoe’s bubbling laugh, Caleb’s voice asking a question.

Tammy sinks onto the floor and wraps her arms around her knees. Debbie joins her there and rubs calming circles in the center of her back. “I’m such a fucking mess,” Tammy manages to gasp. “God, I am so sorry you have to deal with this.”

“Well that’s stupid,” Debbie says, “because I’m not sorry I have to deal with it at all.”

Tammy makes a strangled sound that’s somewhere between a hysterical laugh and another sob. “You know how,” she says, “when you don’t let yourself cry about something for such a long time, and then you finally _do_ cry about it, and then it’s like…”

“You can’t seem to stop crying about it?” Debbie finishes gently. 

Tammy nods, leaning onto Debbie’s shoulder as a fresh wave of tears breaks over her. “Yeah,” she hiccoughs. “Exactly.”

Debbie holds onto Tammy and rocks her, and Tammy wonders if this is how Caleb and Zoe feel when she comforts them after a tumble or a fight or a nightmare. It occurs to Tammy that she has not been held like this--held by a person who loves her in the purest, simplest sense of the word, who does not expect or demand anything from her in return--in so very long. It is a profound fucking thing, this kind of love. A stunning, dizzying universe unto itself.

“He hit me,” Tammy says hollowly, once her tears have slowed. “Graham, I mean.” Debbie’s grip tightens, but she stays silent.

“I’ve thought about leaving before,” Tammy continues, and much like the crying she finds that now that she’s started talking about this she might never stop. “Lots of times. Sometimes I’d get as far as packing Zoe and Caleb in the car and driving...anywhere, really, but then I’d always end up thinking, ‘what the fuck is even the point?’ Like, where would we go? What would we do? You know?”

“Yeah,” Debbie says quietly.

“He never hit Zoe or Caleb,” Tammy says, unsure of why she’s defending Graham but feeling as if making this specification is incredibly important. “He’s wonderful with them, actually. And not in a fake, keeping up appearances sort of way; he really loves them. Which I know probably sounds stupid and fucking crazy, and I guess it is, but it’s also,” Tammy exhales, “complicated.”

“Are you going to go back?” Debbie asks, very carefully, like a snake charmer or hostage negotiator. 

“No,” Tammy says immediately, and though she hasn’t thought about it she knows her answer is true. “I’m not. There was something so...final, about last night. I don’t think I could go back even if I wanted to. Which is good, I suppose.”

“But scary,” Debbie says, reading her mind, just like always.

Tammy laughs, more than a little bitter. “How crazy is that? I just spent eight years in an abusive marriage,” she spits out the phrase like it tastes bad, “and I’m scared of leaving it.”

“‘Oh, but I loved them too,’” Debbie quotes, almost to herself.

“Sharon Olds.”

“Mhmmmm.” Debbie sighs. “And, to be fair, it’s never easy starting over.”

“You would know,” Tammy says, smiling, just a little. “Jailbird.”

Debbie laughs. Then she gets up and grabs a handful of tissues from a box on the counter. She hands them to Tammy, who wipes her eyes and blows her nose. She gazes up at Debbie. “I have absolutely no idea what I’m supposed to do,” she says seriously.

“Oh, honey,” Debbie says, extending a hand out towards Tammy. “Neither does anyone else.”

***

They’ve been at Lou and Debbie’s for almost 48 hours when Graham finally calls her. She presses ignore and returns to reading Caleb and Zoe their current chapter of _Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets_. She presses ignore the second time he calls, and the third, and the fourth, the fifth, the sixth, the seventh. She ignores his texts, which start out concerned but rapidly spiral into frantic, desperate anger. She deletes all his voicemails without listening to them. She does not tell Debbie and Lou about what’s going on, and it’s partially because she doesn’t want to worry them, but it’s mostly for her own benefit. If she decides it’s not happening, it’s not happening. Denial is a hell of a drug. Eight years of an abusive marriage taught her that better than anything.

A few days after he first tried to contact her, he abruptly stops. An hour passes without a call or a text. Two hours. Three. Tammy knows this isn’t a long term solution, and she knows she needs to deal with this sooner rather than later, but the loft feels so safe, so separate from the larger problems of her real world, and she can’t make herself puncture this little bubble. Not yet.

But then, late one night, someone starts banging on the front door and Tammy realizes that despite her best efforts reality has found her, even here.

“Fuckery,” Debbie says.

Lou springs up from the couch. “Take Tammy upstairs,” she instructs Debbie. “Don’t come back down until I tell you it’s okay. I’ll deal with Graham.” She looks at Tammy. “What should I tell him?”

“I--uhm--I--maybe that...uhm...that--” Tammy stammers, knowing full well that she must look like a deer in headlights, but she doesn’t know she’s supposed to say.

“Nevermind, it’s alright, I’ve got it,” Lou says calmly, before Tammy has the chance to work herself up to a full scale panic attack. “Just go and stay safe.”

Debbie and Tammy rush up the staircase and skid into Tammy’s bedroom. They’ve barely closed the door behind them when they hear Graham’s voice: “Where the fuck is my wife?”

Zoe and Caleb went to bed not quite an hour ago, and Tammy shuts her eyes, sends a quick prayer to whoever might be listening that they don’t wake up for this. 

“Hi Graham,” Lou says, deadly pleasant, and Tammy has maybe never loved another human being more in her life.

“I’m not fucking playing around.” Graham’s voice. “Where the fuck is she, Louise?”

“She’s not here.” Lou’s voice. The door almost shutting, but then someone stopping it.

“You and I both know that she is,” Graham says, and in that moment his tone is so reminiscent of every ugly fight, every single night gone wrong, that Tammy nearly gags.

She hears the almost-shut of the door again, and then the sound of someone being shoved off to the side. Lou, making the small noise of someone in pain.

Debbie tenses, and Tammy whimpers. “I’m sorry,” she says, nearly shoving her whole hand in her mouth in an attempt to stop tears from coming. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, I’m so fucking sorry.”

“Caleb!” Graham yells, his voice rough and heavy and wet. _He’s drunk_ , Tammy realizes. “Zoe! Get down here! We’re going home!”

And that is it. Some final wire inside Tammy snaps, and she knows what she must do.

Tammy’s body moves of its own accord. She stands and leaves the bedroom, even as Debbie hisses frantically at her to come back. She walks through the hall and down the stairs like a woman possessed. _He does not have power over you anymore_ , whispers something in Tammy’s head, and she tries to believe it.

She stops in the middle of the staircase. Graham is at the bottom of it. They lock eyes. She doesn't move. Neither does he. Lou is standing near the front door, leaning up against the wall. Her face is very white and she’s rubbing her left arm, but she appears otherwise unharmed.

“Get the fuck out of here, Graham,” Tammy says, and her voice is so steady that she’s not sure it even belongs to her. “Go home.”

He stares back at her with drunk, shiny eyes. “I’m not leaving without you, Caleb, and Zoe.”

“That’s not happening,” Tammy says simply. “And if you go anywhere near either of those children tonight, Graham, I swear to fucking God you will never see them again. That’s not a threat. It’s a promise. And you know I have the means to keep it. So do not fucking try me.”

Graham looks at Tammy, at Lou. At Tammy again. At Lou. There is an unspoken reckoning between the three of them, a silent squaring and measuring up. Graham squints at Tammy, as if he is seeing her for the first time. It occurs to her that maybe he is.

And then, Graham, miraculously, seems to deflate. Tammy can hear her heart beating in her ears. Graham is still looking at her, but there’s nothing menacing about him anymore, nothing scary. He’s not a monster hiding under her bed. Just a sad, stupid, miserable man. “I still love you,” he says, almost pleading.

Tammy’s gaze is cold and unwavering. “I can’t help you with that,” she says. 

There is one more beat of stillness before Lou opens the front door. “You heard her,” Lou says, shoving Graham towards it. “Get the fuck out of our house.”

They wait until they hear his car start and pull out of the driveway until they move again. Tammy’s legs give out from beneath her and she lands, hard, on the steps. She makes a low keening sound like a wounded animal. Someone hugs her from behind and she realizes that Debbie has come back out. “I’m going to be sick,” Tammy says, and just manages to turn her head away from Debbie’s feet before she throws up all over the stairs.

“Oh, sweetie,” Debbie says, rubbing Tammy’s back. “It’s okay now. I’m here. Lou’s here. We’ve got you. We love you so much. You’re safe.”

Two pairs of hands guide Tammy to the couch. Debbie covers her with a blanket; Lou places a cool washcloth on her forehead. “Here,” Lou says, holding a glass of water to Tammy’s lips. “Get the bad taste out of your mouth. But drink slowly. You don’t want to be sick again.”

Tammy takes a careful sip. “Good girl,” Lou murmurs approvingly. 

“Caleb and Zoe--?” Tammy says hoarsely, too unsteady to ask a complete question.

“Still asleep, somehow,” Debbie says. “A small, good thing.” 

“You were pretty badass just now, Tam,” Lou says, her voice shaky but genuinely admiring. “‘That’s not a threat. It’s a promise.’” Lou’s expression is full of warmth and pride and love. “Tamara Jane Clephane, feminist superhero. Ridding the world of shit men, one abusive husband at a time.”

“Seriously, Tim-Tam,” Debbie says, running a hand through Tammy’s hair, “that was fucking wild. It was like something from a movie.”

“It felt like something from a movie,” Tammy admits. “I know I said all those things but it felt like they were coming out of a different person.”

“That’s sort of how I felt when I went to Claude Becker’s gallery and threatened him with a shiv I made from a toothbrush,” Debbie muses.

“Wait. _What_?”  


Debbie waves a careless hand. “That’s a story for later.”

They are quiet for a moment. “I should probably...get a divorce lawyer?” Tammy says, looking questioningly at Debbie and Lou. “Right?”

Debbie shrugs. “Probably,” she agrees. “But not tonight.”

Tammy closes her eyes and sighs. “Not tonight,” she repeats. Then she stands up. “I’m going to go to bed,” she says. “That was plenty of excitement for now, I think.”

“Do you need anything else?” Lou asks. Tammy shakes her head.

“I’m okay,” she says, and upon catching Lou and Debbie’s matching suspicious glares, she amends slightly, “I mean, I’m not _okay_. But I’m okay enough to sleep. And that’s something.”

Tammy takes all her blankets and pillows from her room and drags them down the hall to Caleb and Zoe’s. They are, as Debbie promised, sound asleep, their darling chubby bodies curled protectively around each other in the king sized bed they’re temporarily sharing. Tammy makes a small nest for herself on the floor and cuddles her way inside of it. She’s not sure if it’s actually comfortable or if she’s just exhausted. Doesn’t really care either way.

She closes her eyes and listens to Caleb and Zoe breathe, listens to water drip from a faucet, listens to Debbie and Lou talk quietly downstairs. She is not okay; she knows that. She knows that she probably won’t be okay again for a long time. But she is alive, and she is here, and she is safe. She has two children who love her. She has Debbie. She has Lou. Against all odds, she has made it this far.

“Thank-you,” she whispers, to no one and everyone. 

She is not okay, but in this moment, in this small corner of the universe, she is happy. She lets this sustain her. She lets this be enough.

**Author's Note:**

> That badass as hell moment at the end of the fic when Graham is all like "Wahhhhhh I still love you" and Tammy says "I can't help you with that" is something I pulled from _Carol (2015)_. Sarah Paulson's character, Abby, says it to Carol's lame-o ex-husband, and it's such a brilliant line of dialogue that I wanted to find a way to have a Sarah Paulson character saying it in this universe as well.
> 
> I've read other fics that feature Tammy's kids, and I've noticed that the names Caleb and Zoe pop up a lot, which is why I chose those names for those characters here.
> 
> Re shiv reveal: I feel like in the movie Tammy references that story to Debbie at some point, like Debbie told her about it? But I can't quite remember, and I liked the humor of including it how I did here, so let's all just pretend this is how it really happened.
> 
> This fic follows a nebulous sort of timeline; I imagine that the pre-leaving sections take place before the heist, and the post-leaving sections take place not long after? I spent a lot of time trying to refine it and be more specific but then I got frustrated and it was making the fic messy and unwieldy and I'm not even sure how important a specific timeline is anyways.


End file.
